


Yet Their Hearts Are Not Changed

by ester_inc



Category: Les Misérables (2012), Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Alternate Universe - Genie/Djinn, Alternate Universe - Magical Realism, Angst, Canon Era, Consent Issues, M/M, Non-Linear Narrative, Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-18
Updated: 2014-11-18
Packaged: 2018-02-26 04:28:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,895
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2638079
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ester_inc/pseuds/ester_inc
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's Enjolras who finds Grantaire, but Grantaire is the one who can't let go.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Yet Their Hearts Are Not Changed

It had been one year, almost to the day.

Grantaire sat in a corner of the back room of the Café Musain and watched, like he always did. Revolution, Enjolras said. Freedom, equality, brotherhood, he said.

_I could have given you those things_ , Grantaire thought, _like sea-smooth stones, freshwater pearls, a peal of laughter in the morning. I would have given you those things, if only you'd asked_.

Now all Grantaire had to give was his unwanted presence, a tongue loosened by drink, and his wits to annoy Enjolras and amuse others with. He had freedom but no purpose. What Enjolras had given to him was equal to that which he had taken from him, and on some days, he could have hated Enjolras for it. Had it been anyone else, he would have, but no one else would have done what Enjolras had chosen to do, and entertaining such thoughts was therefore entirely without merit.

Their eyes met across the room, and Grantaire lifted his bottle of wine in a salute. He knew Enjolras would read the gesture as mocking, but no more so than Grantaire's continued presence in his life. _I'm still here_ , the gesture said, _wasting all the opportunities you so justly gave me. Are you sorry yet? Would you take it back if you could?_

Enjolras' lips thinned, his eyebrows twitching into a frown as disappointment and frustration briefly warred in his expression. The proud tilt of his head, however, the clenching of his jaw -- they spoke of certainty, of conviction. No, Enjolras would not take it back. He had done nothing less than his duty as a man of moral integrity, and thus, as far as he was concerned, he had nothing to apologize for. 

He turned away, to Combeferre, and Grantaire took a long drink from his bottle. He wondered that Enjolras, who believed so fiercely in the betterment of men, could look at Grantaire and see mockery and spite, and only ever that. Each time their eyes met, Grantaire felt like his whole being was leaning towards Enjolras, every line in his body murmuring embarrassing truths. _I adore you. You are the only thing on this Earth that I believe in; please let it be enough. You are the divinity that sees me through each day and into the night. I treasure every word that passes your lips, even the ones that cut me down_.

Perhaps it was this frail, mortal body that was to blame, the depth of his feelings lost underneath the flesh and bone and blood; and perhaps Enjolras wasn't built for seeing what was underneath, or simply never took the time to look, his attention always called away by more important matters.

Perhaps it was for the best. Better by far that Enjolras thought of Grantaire's presence as a protest, a mockery, than for him to know the truth and pity Grantaire for it.

_You are my morning light and my evening star_. The wine washed away the words in Grantaire's mouth before they could be spoken. _My midnight prayer and my afternoon drink. My love is a foreign land, bolts of Egyptian cotton, fireworks lighting up the night sky in China. The words I want to say to you are blue-feathered birds and shards of clay; all that remains of ancient civilizations_. 

What use was any of that to Enjolras? None at all.

-

It had been forty-seven days.

Grantaire had been coming to the meetings for more than a month now, and though he needed less wine to get through them than he had in the beginning, he drank more, if only to see the disapproving look in Enjolras' eyes whenever he caught sight of Grantaire raising the bottle or a cup to his mouth. 

As the meeting came to a close, Enjolras called out. "Grantaire. I would speak with you."

The others cast looks between them, some curious, some hesitant. They had all but accepted Grantaire as one of them, his ability to entertain making up for his lack of conviction, but they would have been blind not to see there was something between him and Enjolras that went beyond clashing personalities. Whatever they thought, they did not voice it, some leaving and others breaking into groups, averting their eyes as Grantaire ambled across the room to where Enjolras was standing with his spine tense and his fingers restless.

Grantaire offered him the wine, knowing it would be declined, and sat at the table, deliberately putting himself into a position that forced him to look up at Enjolras.

Enjolras' mouth twisted, and he sat down as well. "I wanted to ask," he began stiffly, his gaze directed across the room at where the others were speaking in low voices, "how you've been adjusting."

"Well, now." Grantaire studied the way Enjolras' hair framed his face, followed the line of his nose, thought of Greek statues and chiaroscuro paintings. "I have wine, I have good company. What more could a man require?"

"I did not mean for you to waste your life like this," Enjolras said, turning to Grantaire. "All your knowledge, all your wit -- why would you throw it away?"

Grantaire could only shake his head. "You fight for the freedom of men, yet you judge those same men for what they choose to do with their freedom."

"A life spent in the gutter is no life. People have it in them to be better -- to be true to the legacy of those who came before them, and to lead our civilization towards a new era of of enlightenment and liberty. Citizens of Paris will rise, and France will set the foundation for a world governed by courage, equality and intelligence."

"I need not your speeches. The gods of those who came before us were petty and cruel, and they still reside in the hearts of men. I am comfortable in my gutter. My life was lived before I ever met you, and what is left of it is naught but a sigh of a dying man."

Now it was Enjolras who shook his head, distant and disappointed, untouchable. "I found you at the bottom of a bottle, hiding from the world. Nothing has changed."

"If it would please my master," said Grantaire, as petty and cruel as the gods he spoke of, "I might will myself to pretend to be someone more worthy of my master's ideals."

Enjolras slammed his hand against the table. On the other side of the room, conversations paused and slowly picked up again.

"I am not your master," said Enjolras, his voice low and tight with anger, his eyes flashing with fury.

He got up and stalked across the room, away from Grantaire, who was left alone once more. It had been worth it. The memory of Enjolras, leaning in close, furious, was like a fire in Grantaire's chest. It burned him from the inside out, and for a long, long moment, he felt nothing but warmth.

-

It had been one minute, and his new master was still staring.

As he waited to be addressed, he studied the man in front of him, wondering what would be asked of him, and if his time outside his prison would be short, or if it would be long; if his new master would use his wishes in quick succession or hoard them like gemstones. 

The man was tall and fair; his head was held high, and while his eyes were wide with surprise, there was also affront in them, as if he found it insulting that the world was not precisely as he had believed it to be.

Finally, the man spoke. "What is your name?"

"My name?" That had not been the first concern of any master he'd had before, not that he could remember. "My name is whatever you wish it to be."

The man frowned in disapproval. "Every man must have a name."

"I am hardly a man," he said, but this did not please his new master. "Where are we, at this moment? And if I may, I would ask for the year as well."

"We are in Paris, France. The year is 1831."

"France," he repeated, considering. He had been in France before. Once, his name had been Grantaire, and his master had been kind. "Grantaire, then, if you wish to call me by a name of my own choosing."

"Grantaire," the man said, nodding in approval. "I am called Enjolras. I confess I'm not sure what to make of this. I saw you appear from thin air, and while I don't doubt my own eyes or the soundness of my mind, I pride myself a man of reason, and this is not --" 

The man, Enjolras, cut himself off with a frustrated sound. He narrowed his eyes, continuing before Grantaire had a chance to respond. "I do not care what forces you are aligned with. I do not have time for angels nor devils. Before this matter is closed and we part ways, however, I do require an explanation."

Grantaire's mouth pulled into a smile. There was something oddly charming about this Enjolras and his unorthodox approach.

"An explanation? Very well; you shall have one, and here it is. I am an Ifrit, a Jinn, cursed more than two thousand years ago into a life of enslavement. The bottle you found is my home and my prison, and as it is now in your possession, I am yours. You have three wishes. Speak them out loud, and I will grant them. There are but few limits to my power -- I cannot give you true love, and I cannot bring people back from the dead. Once you have used your third wish, I go back to my prison, and even if you hold on to it until the day you die, your touch can never summon me again. Hide me away, toss me into the ocean, give me to a friend; the choice is yours."

At this point, there were a number of things that could happen. A few times, in their fright, his masters had ordered him back into the bottle, never to be summoned by them again; some became thoughtful, considering their options; yet others lit up with greed.

Enjolras looked horrified.

"You are a slave, and I have become your master."

"I see the thought does not agree with you," said Grantaire. "Do you wish me to go back into the bottle? You can continue to live your life and forget you ever saw me."

"How could I ever forget?" Asked Enjolras, beginning to sound angry. "How could I go on to live my life knowing a sentient being is trapped in a life of servitude, at the mercy of anyone who so happens to pick up the bottle that has been turned into their prison? Two thousand years! I will not accept that in all that time, no one has ever thought to free you. Is it not possible?"

Taken aback, it took Grantaire a moment to respond. "There have been some centuries when there was no one to summon me, centuries where I was lost and slumbered. Some of my masters were kinder than others, and did speak of setting me free of my chains; it is possible; but people are often reckless with their wishes, and wasting one of the three on me -- who could blame them for not doing so?" 

He hesitated, because in Enjolras' anger on his behalf, he could see the possibility of the freedom that had for so long been nothing but a dream of a distant shore. Yet in Enjolras, he could also see a firmness of character, an uprightness he'd rarely witnessed in men. It should not have been appealing to one such as he, but he nonetheless found himself not wanting to be deceitful in return. 

"And some, I'm sure," he said, "while they did think my situation unsightly, wondered what I'd done to deserve it, and what I'd do once freed. My kind are not known for kindness."

Enjolras frowned. "I believe a friend of mine once told me a story of your kind, as you say, of a Jinn granting wishes. All I remember is that one should take care to choose their words well. I can imagine that after centuries of enslavement, you might not think kindly upon those who enslaved you. Would you lash out, once freed?"

It was difficult for Grantaire to outright refuse to answer a question from his master, but truth was often an ill-defined concept, easy enough for him to sidestep. Regardless, he once more found himself speaking honestly.

"I don't know how many of my kind remain, or where I would find them. Perhaps I am the only one left, and I'm not certain I would want to know for sure. I can only access my powers when I grant wishes, or if my master wills me to change my appearance; what I might do once there's nothing but my own will to guide my hand, I cannot say."

"I cannot allow you to remain enslaved; it goes against everything I believe in," said Enjolras. "But the kind of power you speak of is not the kind anyone should wield."

"Then give me freedom to stay outside my prison for as long as you live, and use none of your wishes. My power remains harnessed, and your ideals will be appeased."

Enjolras was already shaking his head. "What you speak of is not freedom, and in any case, such a compromise would only mean I'm handing your powers over to someone else to use and abuse after I'm gone. No, I will make my wishes, and you will be free."

Grantaire's breath caught in his throat, whether due to the promise or the fierce resolve lighting up Enjolras' eyes, who could say. 

"I wish --"

Grantaire surged forward and slapped a hand over Enjolras' mouth. 

"You are mad. At least give it some more thought before rushing into it. Given that you're about to grant me my dearest wish, I sincerely hope you're planning to get something for yourself beforehand. If you spend your first wish on me, I will have no obligation to do anything for you. Do you want riches or power, or abilities you do not yet possess? Choose your words well, and I will gladly grant them to you."

Enjolras pushed his hand away, glaring all the while. "I know what to wish for. I want nothing for myself."

Reluctantly, Grantaire took a step back.

"I wish," Enjolras said, his voice clear and strong, "for you to be a man like any of us. I wish for you to be mortal like any of us. I wish for you to be free like any of us."

"You fool." Grantaire gasped, the first spark of magic awakening within him.

"Can you not do it?" Enjolras asked, his fine brows drawing into a frown once more.

"Of course I can do it," Grantaire shouted. "Now I have no choice but to do it! You fool," he repeated, bending at the waist as the sparks in his stomach flared up. "What have you done?"

The sensation grew into a maelstrom, sweeping over him, drowning him. It was unlike anything he'd ever felt, a reverse from how granting wishes usually worked. He couldn't not grant a wish, but he was the one holding all the power, could shape it in his hands and, if he so wished, look for a loophole and fulfill the letter but not the spirit of the wish. This -- this was his power being turned against him, raging through him, uncontrollable, hollowing him out until nothing was left. He screamed as he fell to his knees, as his power, his very essence, drained out of him and the curse was lifted, the invisible chains crumbling into nothing. Nearby, his centuries old prison cracked, light spilling out, and then in a flash, it was gone.

Darkness engulfed Grantaire, and when he came to, moments later, he was laying on the floor, naked and weak as a newborn colt, shivering from cold he'd never before felt. His clothes, his form, his home, had all been woven by magic, and now all that remained was an illusion made true -- the disguise he'd used to hide his true form, a picture of a man, filled with flesh, held up by bones, blood coursing through untested veins.

A hand came to rest on his shoulder, burning like a brand against his chilled skin.

"Grantaire," said Enjolras, sounding shaken. "I feared I'd killed you."

The laugh that escaped Grantaire was raspy and rough, verging on hysteria. "You have killed me."

"You're shivering." Enjolras moved away, and Grantaire felt lost in the absence of his touch. When he came back, Enjolras had a threadbare blanket with him, and he tucked it around Grantaire and helped him sit up. "Here, this will have to do for now. I'll go out soon and find you clothes."

He again made to move away, but Grantaire grabbed his hand, holding it tight enough to turn his skin white and grind his fine bones together. Enjolras didn't try to pull away but merely laid his free hand on top of Grantaire's.

"What am I to do?" Grantaire asked, a pitiful creature looking for a way out of the dark. 

"Live," said Enjolras.

The word was meant as an encouragement, a command, a guiding beacon of hope; but the only light Grantaire saw was in Enjolras' eyes.

-

Over time, numerous things came to stand between them, but there were two that stood out as insurmountable. One was Barriere du Maine. 

The other was this.

It was late and they were alone, an occurrence which hardly ever happened, as it was rigorously avoided by both of them; this once, they had both lapsed at the same time.

Enjolras was tired; Grantaire was drunk.

"Is it so bad, being human?" Enjolras asked, his eyes focused on the books and leaflets spread out on the table.

"If you looked at me more often," Grantaire said, unbidden, "perhaps it wouldn't be."

"Grantaire," Enjolras said. He did not look up.

"You were born in this city," Grantaire said, "and you will die in it. It is the nature of things; it is right. But I am older than Paris. I have forgotten the winds that saw my birth. A year, a decade? This city is a graveyard, and I am already dead."

Enjolras was looking at him now. "Time is what we make of it. Are you so attached to the memory of your own slavery that you cannot comprehend another way to be?"

"Another way to be?" Grantaire let his bottle of wine slip through his fingers. The sound of shattering glass made Enjolras straighten where he stood, and Grantaire laughed, wild. "Another way to be?" He repeated. "If you only knew how absurd your words sound to me. You made me into something I am not; I have no choice but to comprehend it."

He walked to Enjolras, feeling cruel and reckless and more at home in his skin than he had since the moment he'd been infected with humanity. He gave no consideration to Enjolras' level of comfort, coming to a halt a mere breath away. He lifted his hands, burying them in Enjolras' golden hair.

"I was made of _fire_." 

It was a curse and a confession, a promise and a blessing, a condemnation and a plea.

Enjolras grabbed his waist -- with the intention of pushing him away, no doubt, because Enjolras himself refused to retreat or be intimidated -- and in the brief push-and-pull dance of their bodies, they only ended up closer to each other, becoming an unbalanced, tangled, angry creature of confused, conflicting desires.

Their mouths met and and became a battlefield, hard and soft against one another in turns; their kisses were full of teeth, sharp and biting, daring the other to flinch and withdraw. They moved against each other, neither giving ground or gaining it. Grantaire freed a hand from Enjolras' hair, intending to put it to better use, but Enjolras captured his wrist and yanked it back up, his grip so tight Grantaire could feel their bones grinding together.

Grantaire gasped and shuddered, tensing and then relaxing with relief, his whole body saturated in heat. He kept his eyes shut, barely noticing the hard edge of the table Enjolras pushed him against, papers crumpling under the hand he hurriedly put out for balance. Enjolras found release soon after, his breath hot and trembling against Grantaire's cheek.

They did not separate with haste. They took care in establishing a safe distance. But that distance, once established, was definite, unyielding, inviolable.

"This will never happen again," said Enjolras, his demeanor that of a stature, distant and uncompromising.

Grantaire, starting to remember why he usually avoided touching Enjolras, even so much as brushing against him by accident, merely nodded.

"We will not speak of it," he said, shivering; the cold always felt worse afterwards.

Enjolras left, presumably to seek sleep.

Grantaire left in search of more wine.

-

The months piling upon themselves had more or less numbed Grantaire to his current existence. He still remembered the look in Enjolras' eyes when he'd said, _Live_. It was the only command he'd ever given Grantaire out of kindness. But Grantaire didn't know how to live; he had no will to. He merely existed, day after day, night after night, drinking, reading, dancing, fencing, boxing; walking the streets of Paris until his feet threatened to leave him behind; lying in bed until the red rivers of wine ran dry; dabbling in many a thing, applying himself to various and sundry pastime activities, yet committing himself to nothing.

The only thing that remained constant was his involvement with Les Amis de l'ABC, if it could be called involvement when he cared more for his drink than for their cause, and was rarely of use for anything at all.

Why Enjolras allowed him to stay was a mystery to him.

"If I'd looked less like a man when you first saw me," Grantaire had once asked him, "would you have been so quick to free me?" 

Enjolras had replied with all the conviction of the righteous, and Grantaire could not with good conscience say that conviction was wrong. If it wasn't out of guilt that Enjolras tolerated his presence, perhaps it was because of those scant minutes he'd spent having ownership over Grantaire -- and because of what had followed directly after. Some lingering sense of responsibility, however tainted, kept him from sending Grantaire away.

He was harsh with Grantaire, his patience worn thin; he berated, he disapproved, he ignored; but he did not force Grantaire's hand.

Sometimes Grantaire wished he would. It would have been easier if Enjolras' expectations could have molded Grantaire into another person, worthy and true. As it was, Grantaire was left in charge of his own actions, and thus he inevitably fell short of Enjolras' lofty standards.

The latest meeting had been held at Corinthe, which Grantaire had found one fine evening early into his mortality. It wasn't quite the same now that Father Hucheloup had passed away, but Les Amis still often came there to eat, drink and plan, and those plans were slowly turning into action. The future was little more than the wind whispering in Grantaire's ear, but he'd lived long enough to sense the storm on the horizon -- could feel it on the streets, in the air. 

Could see it in Enjolras, in the way he became more alive with each passing week.

A star had no reason to seek out the celestial body orbiting it, and so it was rare for Enjolras to seek out Grantaire. But like stars, exceptions too were a fact of life.

"You have been in the cups again, I see." The night had worn down the sharpest edges in Enjolras' voice, but nothing would ever make him sound kind, not where Grantaire was concerned.

"Again, still, once more," said Grantaire. "I am constantly, unendingly, unceasingly drunk, day and night, everlasting, amen. This is me now; you have found me out."

Enjolras sat down next to him. "I hardly know what to do with you."

"And so you do not a thing. A wise man, for there is very little one can do with one like me. You did right to throw me away. I am not Osiris; king or not, he was more worthy than I; and your reasons are by any account more pure and honest than those of Set."

"I did not throw you away," Enjolras protested, frowning. "You have thrown yourself away."

"So I have; I have thrown myself away. If you were Isis, I could still be saved; but you are a storm born of Set, a fire born of Ra. I am not Osiris, and you are not for me."

"I wish you would be more serious."

Grantaire laughed, and Enjolras winced, very slightly, and looked away.

"I will drink to that, and that is your wish granted, for if there is one thing I am serious about, it is my drink," Grantaire declared, grandly raising his cup.

"I _wish_ you would drink less," Enjolras said.

"And I often wish I was still that which I was born to be." Grantaire drained his cup. "That is ample reason for anyone to drink."

"You were a slave."

"I was enslaved, yes, my abilities harnessed for the use of others; but I had use. I had a purpose."

"And you would have those things once more," Enjolras said, his tone getting more heated, "if you applied yourself to something other than drinking."

"There used to be a sun at the centre of my being," Grantaire said, contemplating his empty cup. "Now wine is the only warmth I can afford."

Nothing of amusement remained in Grantaire. Enjolras' company and the sudden lack of wine had made him morose, wistful.

"I could have helped you," he said before Enjolras could speak. "I had no power to change the world for you, but three well placed wishes would have gotten you far."

"We are fighting for the equality and freedom of all." With each word he spoke, Enjolras slipped farther away, becoming more distant -- a star returning to its rightful place. "What kind of example would I set -- how could I be certain that I'm building on firm ground -- if I relied upon slavery and trickery to get me there?"

"And what you did to me --"

"What I did, I did out of mercy."

"Enjolras," Grantaire said, feeling tired and tender, "you don't know the meaning of the word. You are not a man of mercy. You are a man devoted to Justice, and like all men who worship her, you are blind and hard and cold."

What fine marble, indeed.

-

It had been three days, and Grantaire was tired and cold.

Enjolras had found him clothes, as promised, and his friends had found him lodgings; he would have to find a way to pay them back.

Grantaire had found wine, and it helped, a little.

He thought of walking away, walking until he came to the ocean, walking until his frail new body was taken by the currents. But he stayed, because he was cold, and the ocean was cold, and Paris was an ocean in its own right.

He stayed, because he had nowhere else to be, and nowhere else he wanted to be. Enjolras' conviction had freed him and captured him in equal measures. It was Enjolras' fault that Grantaire was here, and perhaps he felt no guilt over it, but that didn't mean Grantaire would let him forget.

He tried not to think about the sickly, hollow places in his chest, which only ever felt whole when Enjolras was near, and instead set out to learn all he could about his new home, his prison, his grave. He supposed, on the surface of it, not much had changed; his existence was as wretched as it ever had been, only shorter and much, much colder.

If only it hadn't been Enjolras who had summoned him, saved him, condemned him.

If only it were all trick of light -- this foreign, familiar land; this cold weather of the soul; these sickly, hollow places in his chest.

-

He slept when his friends died; this was the truth Grantaire did not have to live with, for when he woke up, he knew at once what had happened, and what was about to happen. He was awake; his timing was impeccable; his mind was clear.

He announced himself. He declared himself. He would die knowing himself. 

It was more than he would have dared to wish for, even a day in the past, even an hour. Standing next to Enjolras, hand in hand before death, the great equalizer of men, Grantaire's blood sang with warmth. It was the nature of things; it was right.

_You and me_ , he said to Enjolras in not so many words; _we are blue-feathered birds and shards of clay; all that remains of ancient civilizations_.

And here at the end, when there was nothing else left to see, Enjolras saw Grantaire, saw through him, saw all of him, and smiled.


End file.
